This is not for me but a friend who I proudly convinced to return his $2400 powerbook.

He has 2400 bucks to spend and wants something pretty high end. I've found a few:

emachines- 6811 looks good to me but worried a little about emachine quality
compaq/hp- weak gfx with Athlon64 offerings, better with p4's but its a p4 dell- XPS looks like it has potential (mobile 9800!) but it's friggin huge!
alienware- cheesy and out of budget

any other suggestions?

Main uses: dvd shrinking/burning, web graphics/flash, gaming, and folding. Nice displays and widescreens are a plus, along with a moderate size and weight.

i would say wait justa little while - for the best gaming lappy yould would want a amd64 3700 / ati 9800 - the new 3700 kit is low wattage built on .09 nano. I would say wait for voodoo. the Hp grafix makes me vomit the need the hell slapped out of them for pairing the chip with those grafix.